Walt Disney Co. said it will stop financial support for Boy Scouts-related organizations beginning next year because of the Scouts' policy banning adult leaders who are gay. The Boy Scouts said it is "disappointed" with the move. The company's decision was made public after the president of a Boy Scouts council in Apopka, Fla., sent local troops a memo on Disney's move. Robert Utsey's letter was posted on a website for Scouts for Equality, an organization advocating against the ban on gay leaders, according to the Associated Press.

Starting in 2015 the Boy Scouts of America's policy banning adult leaders who are gay will cost the organization donations from the Walt Disney Co. Though Disney doesn't provide money to the Boy Scouts' national or local councils, the Burbank-based company with major theme parks in Anaheim and Orlando, Fla., provides small grants to local troops and packs, said Deron Smith, a Boy Scouts spokesman. “We believe every child deserves the opportunity to be a part of the Scouting experience and we are disappointed in this decision because it will impact our ability to serve kids,” Smith said in a statement.

Re "A clear message in Arizona veto," News Analysis, Feb. 28 The Times explains the motives behind Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer's veto of the anti-gay bill recently passed by the state's legislature. Prominent Republicans urged Brewer to veto the bill because of the need to focus on the economy rather than divisive social issues, which could hurt the party in the November midterm elections. What they didn't make a big deal about was that the bill was bad because it was mean-spirited and bigoted.

In Arizona, corporate presure might have helped persuade Gov. Jan Brewer this week to veto legislation derided as anti-gay. Now in Boston, this weekend, political pressure appears to be reopening a door for gays to one of the major events in the city, the St. Patrick's Day Parade. Gay rights groups haven't been invited to march in the annual parade in South Boston since 1993, and the U.S. Supreme Court has affirmed the right of organizers to keep openly gay marchers out. But new Boston Mayor Martin Walsh said this week that he would boycott the March 16 parade, in keeping with the tradition of his predecessor.

The ability to disguise is valued in football, as it is essential to fooling an opponent. In a sense, offensive lineman Roy Simmons was better at concealing than most. Simmons hid his homosexuality from his New York Giants and Washington Redskins teammates throughout his career, and in retirement became the second NFL player to announce that he was gay. "If Roy had come out when he was a player, he would have been accepted," former Giants teammate Harry Carson said last week.

HOUSTON - One day after a federal judge struck down Texas' ban on same-sex marriage, the state on Thursday appealed the ruling. Texas is one of several conservative states, including Oklahoma and Virginia, in which federal judges have struck down bans on same-sex marriage. U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia in San Antonio ruled Wednesday that the ban was unconstitutional. He wrote that it deprived same-sex couples of due process and equal protection of the law, stigmatizing them and treating them differently from other couples.

South Carolina lawmakers voted Wednesday to cut $69,000 in funding to two public universities that had assigned gay-themed books as reading for incoming students. The books are "Fun Home" by Alison Bechdel, a finalist for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award, and "Out Loud: The Best of Rainbow Radio," a collection of stories broadcast on a South Carolina radio show. The University of South Carolina Upstate would lose $17,000 for assigning "Out Loud," while the College of Charleston would lose $52,000 for assigning Bechdel's "Fun Home," a memoir told in graphic novel form, to incoming freshmen.

HOUSTON - Mark Phariss almost didn't file the lawsuit that led a judge to overturn the Texas ban on same-sex marriage this week . One reason: Phariss, a Dallas corporate lawyer seeking to marry his partner of several years, has long been friends with one of the conservative state officials he sued: Texas Atty. Gen. Greg Abbott. The two men grew up about 50 miles apart in conservative country - Phariss in Lawton, Okla., Abbott to the south in Wichita Falls, Texas. Later, they became friends during law school and stayed in touch over the years with an occasional meeting or Christmas card.

The six state attorneys general who have declined to defend their states' bans on same-sex marriage in court got some encouragement this week from U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. In a speech to the National Assn. of Attorneys General, Holder said that it was sometimes appropriate for attorneys general to abandon their usual obligation to defend the constitutionality of state laws. This page supports same-sex marriage unreservedly. But even so, we worry that Holder's comments will embolden additional state attorneys general - Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives - to pick and choose which of their states' laws they will defend in court.